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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29391426">Dreaming About the Stars</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/fieldoffantasies/pseuds/fieldoffantasies'>fieldoffantasies</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Earth Girl Trilogy - Janet Edwards</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 08:29:07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,042</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29391426</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/fieldoffantasies/pseuds/fieldoffantasies</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Jarra's journey to Fortuna was a culmination of all her life experiences before. She reached towards the stars and never stopped.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Dreaming About the Stars</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This was a 2am idea that was subsequently written while completely sleep deprived. Enjoy :)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Jarra stares up at the night sky and sees millions of stars and worlds that she can never reach. She’s going to be trapped on Earth for the rest of her life, but at least she’ll move on beyond the brown clothes of Home with Issette and Keon and Maeth and Ross and all of her other friends. There are billions of stars and people and planets out there but Jarra is stuck on a single planet, orbiting a single star and she realizes she’s still angry that the rest of humanity has the universe to explore.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Jarra goes into the history track at school. She learns about the Apollo missions bringing men into orbit around Earth and eventually, to set foot on the moon for the first time. These men were not limited by a Handicap. They could travel towards the stars without fear of their own bodies turning against them. They weren’t trapped on Earth. There were no limits preventing them from taking the first steps amongst the stars.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Her first time on a Dig Site is at age 11. Jarra hears a whirring engine noise, looks up at the sky, and sees a plane fly overhead. The pilot is unencumbered by the gravity keeping them on Earth. Up in a plane, Jarra dreams she can be free of her Handicap, free of the rules of Next Step and Hospital Earth and the universe, free to explore beyond Earth.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Future visits to Dig Sites see Jarra begging pilots for rides in their planes. Soaring above the working teams scanning for terrain, hazards, and creating a mosaic of the ruins of the past. Gradually, she learns the controls of the planes. How to maintain steady level flight, how to tilt the ailerons up and down to turn, how the thrusters allowed them to escape the ground for the freedom of the sky. Some pilots are happy to have her along - it means a more relaxing day for them. However, there are some who would rather not ever have her in their cockpit again. And Jarra can’t help but wonder, why are they flying for the Dig Site Federation if they hate history?</p><p>When Crozier discovers Jarra has been going up in planes without him knowing for years, he is less than thrilled. However, he doesn’t stop her. Knows that even if he does, she’ll find a way into the sky.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Jarra’s first step beyond the confines of Earth is when she is 14. One moment she’s in a hospital on Earth and the next she’s on some other, unknown planet in blinding agony as her immune system shuts down and denies her the stars she’s been dreaming of her entire life. For Jarra, this was her last chance to escape the confines imposed on her by a terrible role of the genetic dice. But the doctors hadn’t made a mistake at birth. She is a girl who is fated to live her entire life on Earth. A girl destined to never explore other worlds. A girl who is chained to a rock hanging in the center of humanity but still will never be acknowledged as equal to the rest of them because she can not step among the stars.</p><p>~~~</p><p>As Jarra goes through Next Step, finishes school, looks towards submitting University applications, and continues to learn the extent of the horrors against the Handicapped. People like her who had no control over which planet they lived on, the laws that ruled their lives, who were trapped and suffered for it. She doesn’t stop flying. She doesn’t stop pursuing history. She may be stuck on Earth but that doesn’t mean she isn’t worth something. There are hurdles, but she is Jarra Reeath and she can fly and those are meaningless next to her determination. Jarra applies to University Asgard. The norms won’t know she isn’t like them, but she can prove to herself that she is human, that she is just as good or even better than any of them.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Jarra Reeath is a military kid who grew up with a loving family amongst the stars, can fly a plane, knows all about history, and flip a person over her head. Jarra Tell Morrath is a military Honour Child who didn’t know she had a family who wanted her until right before they died and is stuck on Earth but she still can fly, go on about history, and flip a person over her head. Jarra is still Jarra, those around her just know the full story rather than the one hiding who she is. And to her shock, those close to her don’t abandon her as lesser, not worthy of being human. They stick to her side and understand.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Alien contact is on Earth and Jarra is grazzed. The biggest event in recent memory and she is part of it - not limited by her Handicap. Something everyone thought would involve stretching across light years of space is at the center of humanity. At the place where they discarded those thought of a throwbacks, where those thought of as lesser lived. But at the same time, Jarra feels that she doesn’t belong. She isn’t as worthy as the fighter pilots up in space guarding the sphere. She doesn’t have the training to make command decisions or act as a Military officer. Yet, here she is standing alongside Fian in a Military uniform, giving advice and knowledge to high ranking officers, those who had spent their entire careers pushing the boundaries of humanity further into the stars. She is a part of it, yet they wouldn’t allow her to set even a single foot out of the atmosphere into the vastness of space.</p><p>~~~</p><p>Jarra found the alien planet and now stars twinkled under her skin mirroring the night sky. She was going to step out of the atmosphere of Earth, out of the Sol system and survive like so many before her could not. And so she steps onto the survey ship, goes through the portal, and sees the curvature of Earth below her and the vastness of space around. Jarra is an Earth Girl, but when asked “are you ready for this?” She responds “I’ve been ready for this all my life.”</p>
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